Weekly SpinOn:
Mozart’s Many Faces

Mozart’s Many Faces brings together four works from different moments in Mozart’s life. The playlist moves chronologically from Salzburg to Vienna and from court music to opera and sacred music. Each track represents a different genre and a different working situation. Together, the pieces reveal not a single Mozart, but a composer whose music changes with place, purpose, and moment.

Track 1: Symphony No. 33 in B-flat major, K. 319 – I. Allegro assai – Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Berliner Philharmoniker · Herbert von Karajan

We begin in Salzburg. In 1779, Mozart was back in his hometown, once again employed by the archiepiscopal court. He was 23 years old. The position offered security and a regular income, but it also meant working within a rigid hierarchy, with little influence over repertoire or working conditions. Symphony No. 33 comes from this moment. It is the last symphony Mozart wrote for the Salzburg court and marks the end of his work within this system, just before he began to seek greater independence in Vienna.

The symphony was written for practical use. It is compact in scale and designed to function within everyday court music-making. Mozart prepared different instrumental versions, adapting the work to the players available. Rather than expanding the genre, the piece brings Mozart’s Salzburg symphonies to a clear conclusion.

Herbert von Karajan made this recording in 1965 in St. Moritz, working in the Hotel Reine Victoria rather than in a permanent studio. He returned to St. Moritz repeatedly over many years and recorded there on several occasions, especially during the 1960s. Mozart played a central role in Karajan’s recording work. In his recording catalogue, Mozart is among the most frequently recorded composers, second only to Beethoven, and Symphony No. 33 was a work Karajan returned to more than once.

As the opening track of Mozart’s Many Faces, this recording sets the stage for the journey. It introduces Mozart at the end of his Salzburg years, just before his move toward a freer and more uncertain life in Vienna.

Track 2: Adagio and Fugue in C minor, K. 546 – Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Berliner Philharmoniker · Herbert von Karajan

Vienna offered Mozart what Salzburg could not: independence. After leaving court service, he worked as a freelance composer and performer, organising concerts, teaching, and composing on commission. By the late 1780s, however, this freedom had become fragile. Public concert life was changing, income was uncertain, and Mozart was forced to rethink how and why he composed.

The Adagio and Fugue in C minor, K. 546, written in 1788, belongs to a period in which Mozart increasingly engaged with older compositional models. No specific occasion for the work is documented. During these years, Mozart was studying music by Johann Sebastian Bach and George Frideric Handel intensively, partly through the influence of Baron van Swieten and his private circle in Vienna, which was devoted to the revival of this repertoire. K. 546 is closely connected to this phase of study and stands apart from Mozart’s operas and symphonies of the same years.

Interestingly enough, this recording was also made at the Hotel Reine Victoria in St. Moritz. Karajan returned there repeatedly during the 1960s, recording in the same setting almost every August between 1964 and 1970. The performance heard here was recorded between 7 and 12 August 1969 with the Berliner Philharmoniker. Mozart was a central focus of these St. Moritz sessions, and Adagio and Fugue in C minor, K. 546, is one of fifteen Mozart recordings Karajan made there. It is also one of only two recordings Karajan made of this work.

Following the Salzburg symphony, this track presents Mozart in a very different situation. The security of institutional employment has disappeared, and with it the need to write for a clearly defined function. From here, the playlist moves on to a third face of Mozart, shaped by the theatre and the public world of opera.

Track 3: Don Giovanni, K. 527, Act I: No. 7, Duet “La ci darem la mano” – Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Kathleen Battle · Samuel Ramey · Berliner Philharmoniker · Herbert von Karajan

By the late 1780s, Mozart was increasingly dependent on opera commissions. As we have already seen, income from concerts and teaching was unreliable, and large instrumental works no longer guaranteed financial security. Opera, by contrast, offered concrete advantages: a fixed commission and income tied directly to rehearsals and performances. Don Giovanni was written in 1787 as a direct follow-up to Le nozze di Figaro, after its success in Prague had clearly surpassed the Viennese reception. The opera was first performed on 29 October 1787 at the Estates Theatre in Prague and marked Mozart’s second collaboration with the librettist Lorenzo Da Ponte.

Don Giovanni occupies a central place in Mozart’s operatic output. Described as a dramma giocoso, the work combines comic and serious elements within a single dramatic framework. Its libretto centres on an unrepentant libertine whose actions cut across social boundaries and who is ultimately punished rather than redeemed. From its earliest performances, the opera attracted sustained attention and has since become a core work of the operatic repertoire.

The duet “La ci darem la mano” appears early in the opera and is one of its most widely recognised numbers. Don Giovanni addresses Zerlina, a young woman about to be married, and attempts to persuade her to follow him. The scene is built with deliberate simplicity and closes with both voices joining together. The duet soon circulated independently of the opera in arrangements and variations, particularly for piano. Among the best known are Ludwig van Beethoven’s Variations on “La ci darem la mano”, WoO 28, and Frédéric Chopin’s Variations on “La ci darem la mano”, Op. 2.

Herbert von Karajan returned to Don Giovanni repeatedly throughout his career, from the 1930s to the late 1980s. He recorded the duet heard here in January 1985 in Berlin with the Berliner Philharmoniker, as part of his final complete Don Giovanni. Zerlina is sung by Kathleen Battle and Don Giovanni by Samuel Ramey, both of whom also appeared in Karajan’s last Mozart opera production in Salzburg in 1987. The recording reflects Karajan’s long-standing engagement with one of the central works of the operatic repertoire.

Track 4: Ave verum corpus, K. 618 – Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Philharmonia Orchestra · Small Choir of the Singverein · Herbert von Karajan

We arrive in Mozart’s final year. In 1791, he composed a short, independent work titled Ave verum corpus during a stay in Baden near Vienna. The piece was written for Anton Stoll, a friend and acquaintance who worked there as a schoolteacher and choir director. Mozart was frequently in Baden at the time because his wife Constanze, was staying there for medical treatment. Ave verum corpus was not an official commission, but written as a gesture of friendship. But what gives this brief hymn particular significance is that it is generally regarded as Mozart’s last fully completed composition.

The text Ave verum corpus means “Hail, true body” and refers to the body of Christ in the Eucharist. It is a short liturgical hymn, traditionally set simply and directly for church use. Mozart follows this tradition closely. His setting is predominantly homophonic, with a narrow vocal range and restrained harmonic movement. The work was conceived from the outset for a small choir, reflecting the limited forces available at the church in Baden. Its musical character follows function and context rather than symbolic intention.

Herbert von Karajan recorded Ave verum corpus on 28 July 1955 in Vienna with the Philharmonia Orchestra and the Small Choir of the Singverein. Listed as KWV 78 in his recording catalogue, the recording uses similarly modest forces. The resulting sound is notably close and intimate, shaped by the small choir and transparent orchestral writing. In this respect, the recording aligns closely with the conditions for which Mozart originally conceived the work.

As the final track of Mozart’s Many Faces, Ave verum corpus brings the journey to a quiet close. After court service, freelance life, and the opera stage, the music returns to a local moment and a specific community, ending not with a statement, but with stillness.

—  Pia Bernauer (Karajan Institute)